


Sea Change

by Everdistant



Category: BanG Dream! (Anime), BanG Dream! Girl's Band Party! (Video Game)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-12
Updated: 2018-11-12
Packaged: 2019-08-22 11:10:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16596749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Everdistant/pseuds/Everdistant
Summary: Tae loves being with Arisa, talking to Arisa. She wants to spend as much time as she can with her. Unfortunately, she's forgotten the part where she tells Arisa this.





	Sea Change

Arisa's laptop screen is pretty grubby, which is weird, because she spends so much time on it. You'd think she'd obsessively clean it, go over it with one of those wiping cloths (do they have a name?) every hour on the hour. "Hey, O-Tae." But then again, she does spend half her time in her grandma's basement. Something nice like a laptop screen would attract a lot of dust, down here. "Earth to O-Tae."

Tae's tilting her head over at the laptop, screen still on but shifted to its side, like Arisa's trying to hide whatever's on it from her. But Tae's eyesight is pretty good. Also, there's some reflective surfaces in the room. It's a dress. On an online store, she means. It looks kind of expensive, pretty nice. A pastel pink kind of color. Blush tone, she guesses she'd call it, with some frills at the edges of it. Bit longer than knee-length. There's another window, for a coat to go with it, an off-red sort of thing that matches pretty well. "You're blocking the stairs, O-Tae!"

"Mm?" Tae finally blinks, first at whatever she was staring at, then up at the ceiling. She tilts her head, tries to remember where she is until she catches sight of Arisa. "Oh," she realizes. She steps off the first step, to the side, glancing over at her. "Did you want to get back to work?"

Arisa had been talking at school today, about having to move some stuff out of the storage shed and into the store proper. Kasumi and Rimi had suddenly had other plans. Saaya always had her parents' bakery to fall back on. So, Tae got drafted. But lugging stuff around is hard work, even if Arisa's grandma loves telling Tae how tall and strong she is. It's nice. Arisa's grandma is nice.

"Your grandma's nice," Tae adds, and Arisa blinks over at her, like it's a strange thing to say. Which is mean. Doesn't Arisa ever think her grandma is nice?

Arisa lets it go after a moment, brushes out her skirt as she hops up the stairs. "Yeah, let's get back to work," she responds with a roll of her shoulders. "We've got all the heavy stuff done, so the rest should be easy."

Tae follows after her, taking the steps two at a time, and they get back to work. She's not wrong - it's easy work, after the labor of moving what felt like boxes of rocks (pottery, according to Arisa) out of the storage shed. Tae crouches down, hefts up another box, and decides to go for another, breathing out from her nose as she stacks a second box on top of the first.

Arisa lets out a low whistle, which is another odd thing to do. "You sure you got that?" She asks as she falls into step alongside Tae. They're both out the shed's door, and at least the walk to the actual store is pretty simple and quick. Arisa's grandparents must have gotten the property while the economy was good, because there's enough space for the shed, the store, and their house. Pawning must be good business, too.

"Yeah," Tae finally grunts, adjusting her grip on her pile of boxes. Arisa's looking at her arms as she walks, for some reason. "Careful on the steps," Tae has to remind her, and Arisa rolls her eyes.

"How many times do you think I've carried stuff from the shed to the store?" she gripes, and then jabs her foot into the little step leading up to the store's backdoor, a quick swear under her breath as she stumbles backwards. Tae hurries over, arms full, catches her with her elbow and side. Arisa falls back, but she's leaning back against her, so it's fine. Tae can feel her lighter, smaller weight against her.

"You okay?"

"Ugh. Yeah, yeah, I'm fine."

Tae smiles over at her as she pushes her back up with her elbow. She crouches down a little, scurries around Arisa (Arisa gives her another odd look) and holds out her armful of boxes, nudging into the one Arisa's carrying from below. "I'll get that," Tae says.

"I just smacked my toes into the step! Seriously, it's no big -"

Tae lifts up her pile of boxes, pushes the one Arisa's carrying up through and out of her hands, Arisa's arms dropping back to her sides, defeated. Defeated's an odd word for it, but that's the expression on her face, and it does fit Arisa's way of thinking.

Tae nudges her with her shoulder before turning around. "You go back to the shed and check your foot. There's probably ointment or something in there," Tae says, then pauses. "Something soft to rest it on." She pauses again. "... omamori?"

"I'm not praying for my foot bruise to go away," Arisa gripes. When she turns to walk off, she hisses a little, seemingly surprised by the pain of putting weight on her injured foot.

"I am," Tae replies, hefts up her boxes, and turns to go back into the store.

 

* * *

Tae doesn't let Arisa work at all for the rest of the process, which takes at least another hour. Tae doesn't exactly keep track, but it's near sunset by the time she's moved the last box over to the store. Arisa grumbled at first, but by the end she was grateful for a chance to sit around and have Tae do all the work. Tae's grateful Arisa isn't in pain, so everyone's happy.

"Good work," Arisa says, lowarm throwing a bottle of water over to Tae. Arisa has a mini-fridge somewhere around here, probably, since the bottle's cold. Tae holds it up to her cheek as she glances around the shed to try and spot the fridge. When she can't find it, she looks down at the bottle, curious.

Arisa's seated on a table, laptop in her, well, lap. From the way she's drumming her fingers against the keyboard, thumb of her other hand up to her lips, she looks like she's worrying about something. Like one of her auctions for her bonsai, maybe.

Arisa must want that dress she saw earlier. There'd been that star at the top of the browser window. She thinks that means Arisa bookmarked that page? She must be looking at it a lot. Poor Arisa. Ryuseido stays in business, but she doubts it brings in the big dolla dolla bill y'all.

"Cash rules everything around me, huh," Tae thinks aloud, and Arisa shrugs, points her thumb over her shoulder.

"Just about," Arisa responds, and Tae gets this big grin on her face. It makes her really happy, when Arisa just responds to her. Tae feels like she has to double back in conversations too much, even though Arisa's pretty simple. Everyone else is pretty simple, too. Maybe they're so straightforward they don't get where she's coming from. Is that why her mom says she's mature? Oh, wait, Arisa's saying something.

"... take anything you want from the shed," Arisa finishes, and Tae doubletracks back to, oh, she's actually getting paid for the work. Huh, Wyclef, Akon, and Weezy weren't kidding.

"Anything?" Tae parrots, glancing around. For a moment, she reaches for Arisa. Arisa pulls her laptop back, instead of herself, which is weird.

"Yeah, very funny," Arisa grumbles, waving Tae off. "I'll veto anything I think is worth too much."

"... I'm glad you like yourself, Arisa."

"Huh? This laptop took me like, a year to save up for, and it still chugs when I open videos."

Tae blinks, owlishly, at Arisa, not following her logic at all. Arisa blinks back, then sighs, waves her arm around the room. "Just grab something. Iunno if there's anything you'd be into in here, but you could get something for your mom."

Arisa sounds a little annoyed, so Tae takes the advice, stepping around the shed. They've cleared out everything that Arisa's grandma thought would sell, so frankly, there's not a whole lot left. Old furniture, mostly, and Tae isn't even sure how she'd get that stuff home. She's about to settle for a lamp she thinks her mom would like when she spots a set of plates.

The plates have *bunnies* on them. Tae hurries over, peering at them, admiring them from above and then from below. It's a light beige color, fairly well-detailed. It has bunnies on it. "Arisa," she asks over her shoulder, and Arisa looks up from her laptop.

"Huh? Those tacky things? I think Granny bought them off some American. They've been in here for years. Grandma liked them 'cause they looked kinda rustic, but dishware's kinda hard to sell. Most people who buy tacky old plates and stuff already have stuff they're happy with."

Tae isn't really interested in the business side of this, though. How could it not be worth a lot? She likes it.

"Can I have one?" Tae asks, and Arisa shrugs.

"Take as many as you like. Heck, take the entire set. There's bowls, cups, whatever. It's been sitting in here longer than I can remember."

Tae's already gathering up everything before the words are even out of Arisa's mouth. She's got plans, capital P, Plans, forming in her - capital P, add a z, Planz - brain, and somehow this (adorable) kitchen set is a central part of them.

She hopes it'll all work out, though.

 

* * *

Just like last time, Tae's helping out with a friend's family business again. It's Saaya's bakery, this time, and the smell of fresh bread is pretty nice. Plus, popping bread into and out of the oven is pretty simple work, way less likely to result in toe damage than moving boxes around. Though with Valentine's day around the corner, plenty of people are here. Which is weird. Wouldn't you want the bread to be as fresh as possible if you were giving it as a gift?

Kasumi and Rimi ducked out of this one, too, which is funny. Unlike last time, Saaya said her mom was willing to pay for the help. Maybe Kasumi and Rimi just didn't need the money. The bourgeoisie jerks. Bourgeois? It was one of those words. They both had a funny feel on her tongue. Actually, she wasn't even sure they were different " _O-Tae, you're gonna burn my bread!_ " words.

"Huh? Oh. Oh!"

Tae hurriedly pulls the bread she was cooking out of the oven, blowing down on it. Kasumi had ducked out of this one, but she hadn't ducked out of a desire to *eat* bread, so she was here, ordering it. Here to watch the proletariat down in the mines, she guesses.

"Jeez, O-Tae, you halfway burned the place down!" Kasumi exaggerates. Probably exaggerates. She sounds too happy to be worried, but maybe Kasumi just really likes fire.

"It's called seizing the means of production," Tae counters as she bags Kasumi's bread, hands it over to her. Kasumi's blinking oddly at that comment. Kasumi's odd blinking is different from Arisa's. Arisa's goes blink, blink, frown, roll. Kasumi's goes blink, blink, blink, blink, blink, blink, blink, blink...

"You seem kinda distracted, O-Tae," Kasumi finally says, and Tae has to shake her head again.

"Just thinking," Tae realizes more than says. "You and Arisa are pretty different, huh?"

"Huh?" Kasumi parrots back, and Saaya sidles in with a snicker, pushing something closed with her hip as she gets to work. She navigates the bakery like she lives there, because she does, which is pretty cool. Tae doesn't navigate her house like she lives there.

"O-Tae hasn't kept quiet about Arisa all day," Saaya explains, weighing two loafs of bread in her hands, pointing one over at Kasumi. After a second, she tosses it over to her, too, which Kasumi catches. In her mouth.

"It's like she's got a schoolgirl crush," Saaya adds.

"That sounds painful," Tae counters, frowning.

"Ihf hiff fuwe?" Kasumi contributes, through the loaf of bread in her mouth.

Saaya grins over at Kasumi, waves her hand. "Yep, it's free, if you promise to stop holding up the line," she says, and then Kasumi glances behind her at a mildly bemused salaryman, hurries out of the way with her bread full of apologies.

The doldrums of work go by pretty quickly, after that highlight. Tae's always been good at spacing out and doing the things she has to do, nothing more or less. It makes her a pretty bad fit for music, honestly, but it makes her a great fit for repetitive labor. She doesn't realize work's over until Saaya's mother is handing her a few bills and thanking her for being such a hard worker.

And even then, it doesn't really register until she sees Arisa, leaning against the outside of the store, poking at some game on her phone. Tae hurries over, four or five steps at a time, big strides, and then leans forward, all at once, slouching on top of Arisa. It's winter, so it's a bit cold. They're both in jackets. Arisa is toasty.

"I'm home," Tae singsongs against Arisa.

"You live out in the snow?" Arisa grumbles back, but she doesn't squirm away, even with Tae's head on top of hers.

"You're warm," Tae agrees. Yep. She lives wherever Arisa is, these days. "I'm not in your comfort zone, am I?"

"You're always in my comfort zone," Arisa snipes back, huffing in a way that doesn't fit her fond tone of voice.

"Arisa.... that's so sweet..."

"I meant that you're way too handsy, dummy,"

Oh. That makes more sense, Tae thinks, and she snuggles in closer to Arisa as she thinks on it. "When am I out of your comfort zone?"

Arisa thinks on it too, for a second, tilts her head. "I guess when we're on stage? You're around, but we're too focused on playing."

"I'm looking at you when we're playing," Tae comments, as if it's nothing at all. She reaches for Arisa's hand, glove against glove. "Hand?" She tacks on. Arisa makes a face two faces really, as she tries to figure out which thing to react to. But, eventually she takes Tae's hand anyways, grumbling wordlessly, and they start marching through the snow. On an O-Tae open-sleigh. Over the streets they go, quiet all the way.

It's not bad quiet, though. Arisa's breaths are toasty, leave little vapors in the air that Tae watches, because they're parts of Arisa. "Hey," she finally asks, tilting her head down at her. "You were waiting for me?"

"Just for a couple of minutes," Arisa gripes, glancing up at Tae before ducking her eyes away. Her face is red, Tae realizes, and she gets why. It's cold. Also, Arisa's embarrassed, like she usually is. Tae squeezes her hand, tighter, tries to transfer some of her comfort with being this close over to Arisa.

It seems to work, because Arisa reaches into her coat's pocket, fishes out a bag of. Chocolate? They're chocolate - little chocolate rabbits. Not like the kind you get in stores, where they're facing you and the chocolate's kinda dense, but smaller, sidelong, on all fours. More rabbit-y, in Tae's opinion, as a rabbit connoisseur. Some of them are white chocolate, some are dark chocolate, but most are regular milk chocolate. Tae should tell Arisa that white chocolate is her favorite, sometime.

Because Arisa's pushing the bag up against Tae's chest, pulling her hand out of Tae's and blushing, deep. "He, here! Happy Valentine's!" She yelps, pushing the chocolate so hard against Tae that she's pretty sure some of the chocolates are cracking.

"That's tomorrow, though."

"Everyone will be around tomorrow!"

"Where did they go today?"

Arisa huffs, pulls her hands away - Tae has to cup her hands below the bag to catch it in her palms, and there's a surprising weight there. There must be a lot of them in the bag. "Did you make these yourself?" Tae asks, and Arisa freezes up, blushes, turns away.

"Yeah, they're a little lumpy, I get it! But... you know, just buying five hundred yen chocolates is so lame," Arisa sighs.

"Were Kasumi's stars?" Tae blinks, glancing down at the bag. "Were Rimi's cornets? Actually, Saaya's would be bread, too. That'd be the same."

"I only made - I only made them for you, you dumbass!"

"Oh."

... That sounds nice. Tae likes that. She lifts them up to her face, turns them over. "Are they any good?"

"They kind of suck."

"Mm," Tae hums as she turns the bag over in her hands, pours a handful of the bite-sized chocolates out into her palm. Their sizes and shapes vary pretty wildly. She tilts her head back, pops the handful into her mouth at once, chews. Arisa's right. They are lumpy.

The taste isn't bad, though. They're sweet, made properly. "Good," Tae sighs out, and Arisa grumbles.

"You're just saying that 'cause you like everything."

"Yep," Tae agrees. She loops her arms up and around Arisa's back, hugs her in close. "Makes it easier for you."

Arisa doesn't have a comeback for that. She just sighs out, flustered and frustrated and a little relieved, too, lets herself be held close to Tae.

 

* * *

 

Valentine's Day comes and goes in a blur. Tae gets a few of those storebought chocolate rabbits Arisa's gift was distinctly not, doesn't think too hard on them as she goes about her business. The month after that is just Tae saving, doing small part-time jobs, and saving a bit more.

Arisa gave her a gift on Valentine's. So she should give her a gift on White Day. That dress - and that coat. She really wants to get them for Arisa. Arisa's always so anxious, she deserves nice things. Tae only ever really wants food for her rabbits and occasionally music equipment, so her cost of living is pretty low. It makes it easy to save, and save, to the point that Tae's mom even comments on the growing stack in the jar she's keeping the dress fund in.

Ordering them is a surprisingly easy process, too. She's worried they won't be here in time for White Day, but they make it just in time, a few days beforehand. She gets some proper giftwrapping for them, too, a box long and wide enough that Arisa might not realize it's clothes right away. It makes it a little inconvenient to lug around, but it's not massive or anything. She could fit it under a Christmas tree.

She stashes the present in her locker that day at school, has to twist it a little to fit it in, but that's fine. All that matters is that she finally has the dress and coat to give to Arisa, and she's vibrating the entire day at school, practically. Now she knows how Kasumi lives her entire life.

When Arisa asks to meet her after school, she's worried the game is up, but she doesn't seem to be in the 'I'm gonna get a gift' mood. She's a little fidgety, nervous, glancing over her shoulder to make sure Kasumi and Saaya aren't watching. It'd be okay if Rimi was watching, huh.

But when Tae goes to get that present and wait for Arisa after school - one of those girls that gave her those chocolate rabbits is waiting for her. Tae barely knows her name. She has a few admirers, though. She's tall, calm, mature. She's not Kaoru, but people like projecting onto her too, she guesses.

This girl doesn't even seem like a bad girl. She's fidgeting a little, too, but - "Uhm, Tae, did you...?"

Tae blinks over at her as she reaches into her locker, barely even sure what she's getting at. "Mm? I can get you some chocolate too, if you want?" Tae blinks as she reaches for the present in her locker, pulls it out - and hears a gasp from behind her.

It's Arisa's voice. Tae knows that without even turning around. Oh, she knows how this looks. With her with this big present, and some other girl there. Arisa's running off, too, heavy steps past the door, something in *her* hands, and Tae's grabbing her present and hurrying off, immediately, after her, only stopping to glance behind her at the girl.

"You!"

"Eh, eh...?"

"Go get Kasumi and Saaya! And Rimi, I guess."

"Toyama, and...?"

"Bread!" Tae shouts back as she rushes for the door. "Bread girl! She makes the bread! Tell them to go stakeout Arisa's usual hiding spots! Also, this isn't your fault! Probably!"

"... Ehhhh..."

Tae's out the front doors of the school either way, though - really, this whole thing is her fault. She should have told Arisa she had a present for her. Arisa gets nervous and anxious about everything, it's obvious she would have assumed she wasn't getting anything in return for those chocolates from last month. Tae needs to learn to adjust to her better. She's a really bad girlfriend.

... Wait. Are they dating?

Maybe she should have told Arisa they were dating, too. She's hurrying past the front gates when she starts getting texts from the others - apparently that girl had been quick about it.

'arisa!?!?!' Is what Kasumi sends her, and Tae glances up as she runs, makes it halfway to an intersection before realizing just running blindly after Arisa isn't going to work. She has no idea where she would have gone. And texting her would definitely just make her madder.

'Kasumi. Could you go check Ryuseido for me' Tae sends back, tapping through her other messages.

Rimi's panicked, crying emoji gets a response of 'Remember the shrine we went to for the fireworks festival? Please look there,' from Tae, and she's halfway through pocketing her phone and trying to puzzle through where Arisa could have gone when Saaya texts her.

'Any idea where she could have gone, romeo?'

'Isn't this way more a Twelfth Night thing?'

'o-tae. focus.'

No, Saaya's right, she realizes. She needs to - think. Where would Arisa go if she was worried? Ryuseido, that shrine... she ran out the front doors of the school, she wouldn't have doubled back to behind it or the roof or anything.

Wait, hadn't Arisa said something during that conversation? When she'd given her the chocolate. Actually, before that. Something about -

Tae's running towards CiRCLE before she even realizes that's where she's running to. She has to orient herself by landmarks before she puzzles together where her feet must be taking her. The texts from Kasumi and Rimi - 'not here!!!' and just a even more worried emoji, respectively - only make her even more certain she's on the right track.

CiRCLE's closed today, she thinks, or at least not open yet, but she reaches for the spare key she has, is surprised to find it it unlocked. When she pushes her way in, there's nobody at the counter, but the door to the stage is open.

And, true to her predictions, Arisa's crouched down at center stage, hugging her knees to her chest. "Who - oh. You already...? Ugh. Go away," Arisa murmurs, rubbing at her cheeks to try and hide the fact that she's been crying. There's a gift wrapped box on the stage next to her, and Tae peers at it curiously as she steps forward.

"How did you get in?" Tae asks, first, trying to defuse the situation a little. Arisa looks away, guilty, so maybe it didn't.

"You gave me a spare key," Arisa lies, and when Tae looks at her, patient, she finally sighs. "Okay, fine! I picked the lock!"

"You can do that?"

"I get locked out of the shed all the time. Or into the shed. It's not really hard, especially if it's an old crappy lock like this place has. You should really get a locksmith in - don't come up here!"

Tae's already halfway to pulling herself up, peers curiously at Arisa. For a moment, even she feels like she might actually listen.

And then she pulls herself up, all at once, nearly flipping onto center stage. She halfway tackles Arisa, surging forward to wrap her arms around the other girl's waist, hugging her close. "Arisa! Present."

"... What," Arisa blinks, eyes red and watery, cheeks a little puffy. She looks red. From having run, too.

Tae pokes the present up against Arisa's cheek, the corner of it jabbing into her skin. "Present," she repeats, and Arisa - lets out the longest sigh she's ever heard from her.

"You don't have to pretend!" Arisa shoots back. "I know I'm annoying, and bitchy, and - God. You're kinda - not delicate, but sensitive? Sometimes you get all intense all at once. I'm not good with that. Why would you like a girl who's -"

"Present."

"Will you shut the hell up!?"

Tae grins, standing back up, reaching to brush her sweaty hair out of her eyes. "That's why," she points out, holding a finger up, to literally point. "Everyone else - well, not everyone, but. People get weird around me. If I say something weird, they act like it's normal. Or if I say something normal, they act like it's weird. They try and laugh if they think I'm trying to make a joke. It makes me feel like I'm going crazy, sometimes."

Tae tilts her head down at Arisa, a curious little motion, Arisa's small body still shaking a little. Tae wants to hug her, even though she just did. Slowly, she reaches her free hand out to Arisa.

"But you just get annoyed with me if I'm annoying you. And you try to actually get what I'm trying to say instead of pretending you get it. I like that. It's sweet."

"... I'm not really good at it," Arisa sniffs, even as she takes that offered hand, lets herself be pulled back to her feet.

"I'm really bad at not annoying you," Tae agrees, and pokes Arisa with the present, one last time. "Present."

She glances at the present, still in Arisa's hands, then at her own, taps them together. "Presents?"

"Uh... mm. Yeah," Arisa - agrees, after a long moment, still trying to work through what Tae just said. Slowly, she holds the gift in her hands out to Tae, takes Tae's from her. There's a moment where they wait for the other to go first, and then they go together, unwrapping their presents to reveal -

Two of the exact same dress. Pink, a little lacy at the edges, a little below knee-length. The only differences are sizing.

"... You absolute freaking moron."

"To be completely fair," Tae starts. "I got you the coat, too."

"Oh, so now *I'm* the cheapskate!"

Tae giggles, and then it turns into a full blown laugh, doubling over. She tries not to ruffle the dress Arisa's gotten her, because it really is quite pretty, but it's impossible not to laugh. "You had those tabs open!" She points out.

"Because I was saving for you! I wanted to get you it for Valentine's, but I didn't have enough! Heck, I couldn't even get the coat!" Arisa stammers back, defensive, huffing even as she hugs the dress Tae has gotten for her to her chest like it's precious. "You're the dumbass that - where'd you even get the money? The coat's nearly as expensive as the dress!"

"I sold those plates."

"You liked those plates!"

"I like this Arisa."

Arisa's eyes go wide for a moment, and then she looks away, hugging the dress further up her face to hide her blush. And completely failing to, because the blush reaches her ears. "You dumbass," she grumbles. "Do you know how many bonsai I had to sell...?"

"Yeah, Arisa's running a ponzi scheme. She's so smart."

"It's not a scheme! I sell perfectly well-groomed bonsai!"

\-- That sets Tae to laughing, again, and this time Arisa lets out a few little giggles of her own. Tae laughs her way forward, hugging herself back to Arisa, arms around the shorter girl's waist, puling her in close. "Mm."

For the first time, what feels like ever, Tae looks down, and catches Arisa's eyes fully. She doesn't tend to look at people's eyes. They're kinda scary. She's good at reading people's actions, and words, but faces are hard, and eyes are even harder. They're supposed to be windows into the soul, but Tae's no soul reaper, soul nomad, soul destroyer, or Sol Badguy, so it's hard for her to tell what's going on with people's souls. That isn't one of her powers.

But Arisa's eyes are so, so beautiful. They're warm, light brown, gentle in shape. They're the part of Arisa that shows how kind and loving she is, Tae realizes.

They're hugging in close, so Tae strokes her hair.

"Arisa?"

"... Yeah?"

Tae leans down - presses her lips to Arisa's, briefly. It's her first time kissing, so that isn't one of her powers, either, but she can feel Arisa's warmth through it, so it's pretty good.

"You've got such a beautiful soul," Tae says, and Arisa audibly *chokes*, surprised and embarrassed.

"Ne, never say that again," Arisa whines, quickly burying her face into Tae's chest, so deep that Tae can't even see her face anymore. "It's - cheesy."

"Heavy?"

"Tacky. Like those plates you sold off."

"Mm. Hey, Arisa?"

"Yeah?"

There's a quiet between them. Tae isn't sure what she should say, now. She feels like there's something left hanging here, even after all of this, something she needs to make clear to Arisa. That'll make things better, from now on. A little more honest, anyway. Oh, that's right -

"We're girlfriends," Tae explains, just to make sure they're both on the same page.

"Oh, thank God," Arisa sighs out, incredibly relieved, and, yeah.

Tae's relieved, too.

Of course, she's a little less relieved when she hears the rest of the band applauding from the audience - Kasumi's laughing, Rimi's misty-eyed, and Saaya's just grinning up at them.

Arisa's bright red, of course, but Tae just leans forward, wraps her arms around her girlfriend, tight. And when Kasumi shouts "Encore, encore," well -

"How long have you idiots even been there!?"

She means she needs to kiss Arisa again, right? Arisa gasps, flustered, but leans into her arms, everyone else erupts into cheers -

So it's pretty perfect.

**Author's Note:**

> Alt. Title - Hanazono Land 2: The Six Golden Words


End file.
